A warehouse is not the most exciting element in many businesses. They are seen as dirty and dusty places where the unseen work gets done and is often an afterthought. The truth is that the warehouse is the beating heart of any business that sells physical products.
It should be treated with more respect in general, but it also needs to be refreshed as well. Times are changing and moving quickly toward the future and too many businesses have outdated warehouses. It’s time to modernize and make it a more efficient entity that plays an even more vital role.
In this article, we will go over how to modernize your outdated warehouse to be more efficient and competitive.
1 - Make repairs
Before you can bring your warehouse into the future, it has to be fixed up for the present. This means making repairs to areas that are left a little rough around the edges. It pays off to have a company come in and fix things up to match what is expected of a modern warehouse.
Miner Corp is one of those companies that will repair your dock door and any other part of the warehouse that has seen better days. This is essential to start with as you may have other structural elements that need to be changed to accommodate the new equipment or software.
2 - Barcode & RFID systems
One of the best ways to bring your warehouse up to modern standards is through the use of RFID systems and barcodes to help you organize. It seems high tech and expensive, but any employee with minimal training can figure out how to use these systems and they are inexpensive.
RFID systems are fantastic at reducing errors in your inventory ot even shipping. With this system, a package leaving the warehouse can automatically be deducted from your inventory as the scanner reads its data as it passes it. It also can alert you to the fact that it is the wrong product before it has a chance to make it onto the truck.
Barcodes do much the same thing but have to be scanned by hand when picking from the shelf.
3 - Use software to visualize workflow
A warehouse management system software is good for many things, but in this case, it can help you visualize your virtual warehouse and see where your most picked items are. You have the ability to see where the bottlenecks are in how your warehouse is laid out and be able to reorganize to reduce them.
This way you can set up zones in which certain items will be grouped together so employees can stay within a small zone. Having to walk the length of a warehouse to pick another item that is likely to be shipped is a waste of time.
You are also able to see how space is used so you can modify the aisle width for instance. If only certain areas require a forklift then you can reduce the space between the other aisles to add more s
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